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Causes of the Vietnam Anti-War Movement

Christina M.
The United States involvement in the Vietnam Conflict created one of the most
prominent and passionate anti-war movements that United States history has ever seen. This
incredible peace movement is every bit as complex as it is inspiring. Understanding the causes of
the uprising and the people themselves is vital to understanding the spirit of the movement. This
paper will argue that the scale of the anti-war movement in the United States against
involvement in the Vietnam Conflict was caused by the backlash of the violent precursor of the
Second World War and events of the Cold War, The Gulf of Tonkin Resolution, moral and
economic ideology, the impact of media exposure, anger towards conscription, and the shooting
at Kent State University.
When World War II came to a grinding halt, the emergence of the new Post-War world
created the necessity for the world leaders of the winning side, the Allied forces, to create the
landscape for a new world. Thus, the epic rivalry of the Cold War was formed: the capitalistic
and democratic United States ideologically pitted against the communist Union of Soviet
Socialist Republics (USSR). The two major world powers split up the territory left in shambles
after the war, temporarily owning the territory until free elections could be held in the nation.
One of the nations split apart by the United States and the USSR was once known as French
Indochina, known today as Vietnam. 1

"The Antiwar Movement," U.S. History: Pre-Columbian to the New Millennium,

Accessed April 15, 2016, http://www.ushistory.org/us/55d.asp.

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United States intervention in the Vietnam conflict was part of the United States policy to
contain communism during the Cold War.2 In 1945, Vietnam declared its independence from
France, once their colonial power. Trouble in brokering an agreement between the two nations
caused a harsh descent into military conflict. After about a decade of violence, 1955 negotiations
in Geneva separated Vietnam into two separate nations in the hopes of facilitating peace. The
Vietminh, communist freedom fighters against the French, ruled North Vietnam, while South
Vietnam was non-communist, ruled by Ho Chi Minh, and therefore their military received the
full support of the United States.3 This conflict of ideology sparked a civil war. In 1968, the war
expanded with the United States governments permission to pursue the enemy into Cambodia.4
The people participating in the anti-war movement were directly impacted by the violence of
World War II and tensions of the Cold War, causing a unique anti-war movement the likes of
which was never before seen and has never been seen again in United States history. The tense
relationship between the United States and the USSR created a global atmosphere of fear,
distrust, and brinkmanship. Events such as the Bay of Pigs, an unsuccessful naval invasion by the
United States of a south Cuban coast, the Cuban Missile Crisis, a contentious event in the Gulf of
Mexico when the United States and the USSR were on the verge of nuclear war, the space race, a
technological competition to be the first on the moon, and the nuclear arms race, the competition
between the United States and USSR to build the most nuclear weapons, took place over a
relatively short period of time. This created a conflict filled lifetime for many young people,

Ibid.
"Cold War - Causes, Events, Pictures, & Videos," History.com, Accessed April 18,
2016, http://www.history.com/topics/cold-war.
4
"Vietnam Online: Timeline: 1966-1970," Public Broadcasting Station (PBS), Accessed
April 15, 2016, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/vietnam/timeline/tl3.html#a.
3

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which drove them to take part in the peace movement against United States involvement in
Vietnam.5
A large part of the anti-war movement against Vietnam was spurred by moral question. The
peace movement believed that the war was unjust, that the Viet Cong, the communist army of
North Vietnam, were only fighting United States troops to protect themselves.6 They knew that
many innocent civilians were being caught in the cross fire, and the environment of Vietnam was
being decimated by foliage-clearing chemicals dropped by United States forces known as Agent
Orange.7 These moral issues became a core reason for many United States citizens to become
passionately involved in the Vietnam anti-war movement.
In late 1964, North Vietnamese forces attacked United States naval forces in international
waters. This attack became known as the Gulf of Tonkin Incident, and the United States
governments response came in the form of a joint resolution to expand United States
involvement, essentially allowing the president to authorize any action he saw fit on the
Vietnamese peninsula.8 This caused another part of the moral conflict for anti-war activists
they argued that the government was bypassing the Constitutional requirement for declaring war
by calling the action in Vietnam a conflict, effectively bypassing the consent of the public.
People in the United States were outraged by this action taken by their government, and

Ibid.
The Antiwar Movement," U.S. History: Pre-Columbian to the New Millennium,
Accessed April 15, 2016, http://www.ushistory.org/us/55d.asp.
7
Ibid.
8
Lyndon B. Johnson, "The Tonkin Gulf Incident: President Johnson's Message to
Congress," Public Broadcasting Station (PBS): American Experience, Accessed April 18, 2016,
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/vietnam/psources/ps_tonkingulf.html.
6

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demanded their government make more Constitutional and transparent actions by becoming
involved in the anti-war movement.9
The Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) famously called for a march on Washington in
protest of United States involvement in the Vietnam conflict in their 1965 statement, The War
Must Be Stopped. This call to action highlighted the organizations ultimate goal of immediate
peace and retraction of all United States troops from the country.10 They believed that the
decisions regarding form of government and foreign policy in Vietnam could only be decided by
the nation of Vietnam itself. The SDS took a true isolationist attitude in their perspective of the
future of Vietnam:
We must not deceive ourselves: a negotiated agreement cannot guarantee democracy. Only
the Vietnamese have the right of nationhood to make their government democratic or not,
free or not, neutral or not. It is not America's role to deny them the chance to be what they
will make of themselves. That chance grows more remote with every American bomb that
explodes in a Vietnamese village.11
They demanded a swift and decisive end to the United States involvement in Vietnam, and call
for the immediate organization of a march on Washington to protest the war.
Dr. Martin Luther King Junior gave a 1967 sermon on the Vietnam conflict at Riverside
Church in New York state outlines his moral reasons for opposing war in Vietnam.12 His
perspective on United States involvement speaks to the dissension and reservations held by many

Jerry M. Lewis and Thomas R. Hensley, "The May 4 Shootings at Kent State
University: The Search for Historical Accuracy," Kent State University, Accessed April 18,
2016, http://dept.kent.edu/sociology/lewis/LEWIHEN.htm.
10
"The War Must Be Stopped," Students for a Democratic Society, University of
California at Berkeley, Accessed April 15, 2016,
http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/MRC/pacificaviet/sdsmarchondc.html.
11
Ibid.
12
Martin Luther King, Jr., "Why I am Opposed to the War in Vietnam," University of
California at Berkeley, Accessed April 15, 2016,
http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/MRC/pacificaviet/riversidetranscript.html.

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involved in the anti-war movement, addressing domestic social issues and the morality of the
war. King was dissatisfied by the funds which were retracted from a poverty aid program he
supported and the disproportionate number of poor young men of color who became victimized
by conscription, to fight a war for a foreign peoples liberty without those same rights being first
guaranteed to them. He argued, We have been repeatedly faced with a cruel irony of watching
Negro and white boys on TV screens as they kill and die together for a nation that has been
unable to seat them together in the same school room. [] I could not be silent in the face of
such cruel manipulation of the poor.13 Another of Kings issues with the conflict was using
violence to seek a solution, while people of color demanding their civil liberties were harshly
criticized for using violence, and were more often praised for non-violent demonstrations. This
showed a harsh discrepancy in the public attitude towards using violence to attain a goal. King
then criticizes the United States government on their failure to recognize the independence
declared by Vietnam in 1945, when the Vietnamese people quoted the United States Declaration
of Independence. He calls into question the moral indication of the United States imperialistic
ventures, including the United States interest and actions in Vietnam. He ends his sermon with a
broad calling home of all troops, in order to focus all attention and resources on turmoil and
injustice in the United States. These moral perspectives were shared by people throughout the
United States at this time, and facilitated the scale of the anti-war movement in the United
States.14
Mass media exposure of the war to United States citizens had a significant impact on the
national attitude towards their nations involvement in Vietnam. Often live and uncensored

13
14

Ibid.
Ibid.

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United States news coverage of events such as the My Lai Massacre struck the hearts and minds
of the people, and swayed many peoples opinions to believe the war was not justified. The
Massacre occurred in an area of South Vietnam which was known as a popular Viet Cong
hideout. United States soldiers attacked a village in search of Viet Cong, killing over three
hundred civilians in the process, and the military leaders responsible were charged with multiple
counts of murder.15 Immoral actions such as these of the United States military being
broadcasted to the nation through news casting had an immediate impact on the scale of the antiwar movement in the United States. As a direct result of this tragedy, the military began phasing
out career soldiers who had been in the war longer than others, and replaced the diminishing
numbers with victims of the United States draft.16
The draft is considered one of the greatest injustices of the Vietnam conflict against
United States citizens. Though the Constitution implicitly states that the government may
institute a draft in times of war, people who held anti-war sentiment were outraged and indignant
at the idea of their brothers, husbands, and sons being forced to fight in a war they believed
unjust.17 Young men who signed up for Selective Service, as the law required, gathered in
throughout the country and in Washington to publicly burn their draft cards, declaring that they
would not fight in a war they did not support.18 When young men were drafted into combat, the

15

"Vietnam Online: The My Lai Massacre," Public Broadcasting Station (PBS): Vietnam
Online, Accessed April 15, 2016, http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/vietnam/trenches/my_lai.html.
16
Rhodes, Henry A., "The News Media's Coverage of the Vietnam War," Yale
University, Accessed April 15, 2016.
http://www.yale.edu/ynhti/curriculum/units/1983/4/83.04.03.x.html.
17
Jessie Kindig, "Vietnam War: Draft Resistance," University of Washington, Accessed
April 15, 2016, http://depts.washington.edu/antiwar/vietnam_draft.shtml.
18
Ibid.

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conflict became an even greater personal threat to United States citizens, and it dramatically
altered domestic sentiment toward the governments actions in the conflict.19
On May 4, 1970, college students at Kent State University in Ohio had been staging an
anti-war protest for several days on campus in response to the United States decision to expand
the war and invade Cambodia.20 As the protest gradually became violent, the Ohio National
Guard intervened, firing shots into a crowd of protesting students, killing four and wounding
several others. While much is still unclear about this event and who could be at fault for the
violence and consequential deaths, the impact of the shooting is undeniable. Students across the
country began striking, and more people began paying attention to the ideals and beliefs of the
Kent State students. The Kent State shootings are often known as the spark that transformed the
small upstart of isolationists into a nation-wide anti-war movement of people from many walks
of life, outraged at the injustices committed by their own government overseas and at home.21
The anti-war movement in the United States against the Vietnam conflict was the largest
our nation has ever seen. Several unique events and factors sparked the scale and passion of the
movement, including backlash of the Second World War and the Cold War, The Gulf of Tonkin
Resolution, moral and economic ideology, impact of media exposure, anger towards
conscription, and the shooting at Kent State University.

19

Ibid.
Jerry M. Lewis, The May 4 Shootings at Kent State University: The Search for
Historical Accuracy," Kent State University.
21
Ibid.
20

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Bibliography
Barringer, Mark. "The Anti-War Movement in the United States." University of Illinois.
Accessed April 15, 2016. http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/vietnam/antiwar.html.

"Cold War - Causes, Events, Pictures, & Videos." History.com. Accessed April 18, 2016.
http://www.history.com/topics/cold-war.

Johnson, Lyndon B. "The Tonkin Gulf Incident: President Johnson's Message to Congress."
Public Broadcasting Station (PBS): American Experience. Accessed April 18, 2016.
http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/vietnam/psources/ps_tonkingulf.html.

Kindig, Jessie. "Vietnam War: Draft Resistance." University of Washington. Accessed April 15,
2016. http://depts.washington.edu/antiwar/vietnam_draft.shtml.

King, Jr., Martin Luther. "Why I am Opposed to the War in Vietnam." University of California
at Berkeley. Accessed April 15, 2016.
http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/MRC/pacificaviet/riversidetranscript.html.

Lewis, Jerry M., and Thomas R. Hensley. "The May 4 Shootings at Kent State University: The
Search for Historical Accuracy." Kent State University. Accessed April 18, 2016.
http://dept.kent.edu/sociology/lewis/LEWIHEN.htm.

"Vietnam Online: The My Lai Massacre." Public Broadcasting Station (PBS): Vietnam Online.
Accessed April 15, 2016. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/vietnam/trenches/my_lai.html.

Timeline: 1945-1950." Public Broadcasting Station (PBS): Vietnam Online. Accessed April 15,
2016. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/vietnam/timeline/index.html#a.

"Timeline: 1956-1960." Public Broadcasting Station (PBS): Vietnam Online. Accessed April 15,
2016. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/vietnam/timeline/tl2.html#a.

"Timeline: 1966-1970." Public Broadcasting Station (PBS): Vietnam Online. Accessed April 15,
2016. http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/vietnam/timeline/tl3.html#a.

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Rhodes, Henry A. "The News Media's Coverage of the Vietnam War." Yale University.
Accessed April 15, 2016.
http://www.yale.edu/ynhti/curriculum/units/1983/4/83.04.03.x.html.

"The War Must Be Stopped." Students for a Democratic Society. University of California at
Berkeley. Accessed April 15, 2016.
http://www.lib.berkeley.edu/MRC/pacificaviet/sdsmarchondc.html.

"The Antiwar Movement." U.S. History: Pre-Columbian to the New Millennium. Accessed April
15, 2016. http://www.ushistory.org/us/55d.asp.